Weak link

3. How can we better measure sustainability?
While not inherent, measuring consumption-reduction projects is imperative to accomplishing sustainability goals. Without measuring these initiatives, leaders are unable to assign a value to them, realize their true cost-reduction benefits, learn from their current projects and reintroduce the most successful initiatives throughout the rest of the business.

Transportation management systems with route optimization, scorecard programs and other measurement applications are essential to tying results back to these projects. In addition to benefiting individual companies, proper measurement, visibility and accountability can positively impact business as a whole. That’s why the work of CSRHub is important – as companies increase the transparency of their CSR actions, the corporations as a whole will become more socially responsible.

4. How can we dissociate with socially-negligent suppliers?
The pervasive thought among many supply chain leaders is sustainability and social responsibility are “indirect” concerns – they impact PR, but not the company’s bottom line. Mattel is proof this isn’t the case. In 2007, when it was discovered that Mattel’s tier two suppliers used unsafe levels of lead paint in its toys, the company had to spend over $100 million in product recalls alone. Because supply chains today are so extended, companies need to do more and complete their due-diligence to ensure they are not associating with irresponsible partners.

5. Who can we trust to drive sustainability?
Lastly, leaders need an individual to carry the sustainability torch. There has to be an individual assigned to integrating sustainability into the company’s DNA – from cradle-to-cradle – in order for sustainability to be realized throughout the supply chain the rest of the business. Practitioners have to step-up to the challenge as well – excited for the opportunity to make what in the past would have been viewed by many as a “horizontal move,” but as Schaffer Consulting’s Ron Ashkenas writes, "these moves are necessary for both careers and corporations today."

Michael Koploy is a guest blogger for CSRHub. He works as a ERP Analyst at Software Advice – a consultancy firm that reviews transportation management systems. You can read more on this subject at the Software Advice blog or contact Michael directly on Twitter @SCMAdvice.

CSRHub provides access to corporate social responsibility and sustainability ratings and information on nearly 5,000 companies from 135 industries in 65 countries. Managers, researchers and activists use CSRHub to benchmark company performance, learn how stakeholders evaluate company CSR practices and seek ways to change the world.

CSRHub rates 12 indicators of employee, environment, community and governance performance and flags many special issues. We offer subscribers immediate access to millions of detailed data points from our 140-plus data sources. Our data comes from six socially responsible investing firms, well-known indexes, publications, “best of” or “worst of” lists, NGOs, crowd sources and government agencies. By aggregating and normalizing the information from these sources, CSRHub has created a broad, consistent rating system and a searchable database that links each rating point back to its source.

image: Darwin Bell via Flickr cc (some rights reserved)

This article is reprinted with permission from TriplePundit.